I'll Never Say I Love You

My jaw dropped as I saw Alex struggling to stop himself from laughing. ‘No, Dad, I am not having sex!’ I answered, frustrated.

“Because if you are, Tahara-“

‘No, Mum!’ I cut her off, embarrassed. There was no way I was discussing sex with my parents. No, no, no, no, no. ‘I’m not having sex, I’m not thinking about sex, there is nothing to do with sex going on with me.’

Alex snorted in his attempt to hold his laughter in. I glared at him.

“If you need to come to us about anything, Tahara, don’t hesitate,” Mum said, hugging me.
I hugged her back briefly and pulled away. ‘I’m walking Alex out,’ I signed, barely looking at my parents. If I spoke I would have been mumbling.

I put on my jacket and walked out the front door, Alex trailing after me. As soon as we were a safe distance away from the unit, Alex burst into laughter at the same time I turned and glared at him, arms crossed across my chest. We both knew the exact distance from the unit where Alex could yell at me and not have my parents hear or see, and we were both taking advantage of it right now.

‘You told them you thought Kyle and I were having sex, didn’t you?’ I asked angrily.

It took Alex a few minutes to calm down enough from his laughter to be able to answer my question. “It may have come up, yes,” he said eventually. “Look, I know it was sneaky. But they’re dying to meet him, I want to be formally introduced to him, and this was the only way I could think to get you in a position where you would have to invite him to a family dinner, me included of course.”

‘I don’t have to ask him,’ I replied quickly.

Alex gave me a superior smile. “No, of course you don’t. Although, the alternative is that your parents keep bugging you about your virginity. From where I stand, your choice isn’t that hard, unless you enjoy getting the ‘is she still innocent’ looks from your dad.”

I glared at Alex for around a minute while he stood there giving me that smug look. After that,
I grunted and walked away. He knew he had won. ‘I am going to get you back for this Alex, just you wait,’ I threatened when he reached me.

“I look forward to it, mademoiselle,” Alex replied, bowing as he walked.

Something was bugging me. I slowed down while Alex continued to walk ahead. Once he realised I wasn’t with him, he stopped and walked back to stand in front of me. He cocked his head to one side, a questioning look on his face. ‘You don’t...” I began, but faltered. I shook my head and started again. ‘You don’t think Kyle and I are actually having sex, do you?’

Alex gave me a sympathetic look. “Of course not, Tarie,” he said soothingly. He turned and started walking towards the road. “Besides, if you did, you would have told me!” he called back to me.

I chuckled quietly as I jogged after him. He was right, after all. I caught up to him and we both walked towards the front of the complex, laughing together. It was amazing how we could fight and bounce right back. I leaned against the normal tree as Alex hopped into Sandy’s car and they drove down the street. These days, however, I didn’t think of the future Alex and I shared, like I used to. I just thought about how lucky I was to have a friend like Alex, who accepted me for who I was, warts and all. He would always be special to me, my very best friend. Sure, every now and then I still got fleeting feelings of a very confusing nature toward him, but I wasn’t sure I could say I loved him that way anymore, not entirely.

At the same time, however, I couldn’t tell Kyle I loved him either. I liked him a lot, but I wasn’t sure whether I loved him or not. I guess only time could tell on that one.

***

The next day was Wednesday. Wednesdays are, hands down, my favourite day of the week now. I have Home Economics, where Kyle and I make plans to catch up at some other point during the day. He always wants me to spend every break with him, but Melissa just glares at him and he quickly changes his mind to just one of the breaks. But, if he gets to me between when Melissa and I split up to get our food and I get to the table, then he always manages to charm me into spending time with Kew, watching him play basketball. I’d like to think I can split my time evenly between my boyfriend and my girls, however.

After Home Economics is Math. Sure, it’s a double block, but like I said the other day – I’m cool with Math. Then we have recess, which I normally end up spending with Kyle. After that, I get to English and my girlfriends glare at me and tut until I apologise. Then everything is back to normal, as far as I dare to dream. I like to think they understand what I’m going through with trying to split my time.

Anyway, English has become my second favourite class after Home Economics. Mrs. Lake is just completely awesome, my favourite teacher of all time. Yeah, I know I thought she was crazy, and she is. After a while, however, you start to like it. Her energy and enthusiasm is simply infectious. At the moment we’re rehearsing the plays we’re going to be performing at the end of semester. As I can’t actually be in the play itself, I spend my time helping out Kate, who is set designer. She’s in the drawing stage at the moment, and once we start making stuff, I’ll be helping her paint.

“So, how’re things with you and Kyle?’ Kate asked, her drawing pad on her lap as she brought her knees up and her pencil shoved behind her ear.

‘Great,’ I answered.

Kate nodded. “You must really like him, with the amount of time you’re spending watching him play some dumb jock sport you hate,” she murmured as she pulled her pencil out and began to sketch.

I tapped her on the shoulder to get her attention, as I hadn’t liked her tone. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ I asked with a frown.

Kate sighed and put her pencil behind her ear. “Tahara, I love you and everything, but I don’t understand why you’re spending half your school breaks watching your boyfriend play some stupid sport that you didn’t even know the rules of before you met him. It’s weird, you know?”

I sighed. ‘Yes, I do know, but he is my boyfriend,’ I reminded her.

“I just feel like you could be spending more time with us,” Kate replied. “Besides, it seems like the longer you and Kyle are together, the more he steals you away from us.”

‘Jealous?’

“You wish!” Kate scoffed, but then softened. “Look, all I’m saying is that I miss my best friend. We all do, Tahara. Just think about it.”

I sighed. People were giving me way too much thinking to do. I thought about Kate’s opinion, Alex’s feelings and my parents’ concern for the rest of the day, seemingly zoning completely out of the world around me. I had thought everything was going right; how could it be so wrong? I continued thinking even after the bell rang. I was waiting outside the library for Alex. For once, he made it out of gym before Kyle. I smiled at him as he approached me.

“Asked him yet?” Alex asked with a grin.

It took all my strength not to slap him. ‘I’m going to do it right now,” I replied confidently.

“Then I guess you won’t mind if I hang here to witness it?” Alex smirked.

I groaned, but refrained from saying anything else because Kyle was approaching. He took a quick glance at Alex and moved to kiss me, but I held my hand in front of my face, preventing him from doing anything.

“What’s wrong babe?” Kyle asked worriedly.

Not knowing whether or not he would understand the entire thing in sign language, and not trusting Alex to translate, I pulled my notepad and pen out of my bag. Would you like to come to my house for dinner Friday? I wrote quickly, and handed him the notepad.

Kyle flashed a quick glance to Alex, and then met my eyes with a cute combination of worry and confusion. “Why?” he asked slowly, handing back my notepad.

I bit my lower lip nervously. I would like you to meet my parents. I met your dad ages ago, so I think it’s about time you met my parents.

Alex, who had been reading what I wrote over my shoulder, cleared his throat conspicuously as I handed the notepad to Kyle.

‘And him,’ I signed to Kyle once my hands were free.

Kyle smiled at me and handed back my notepad after reading what I had wrote. “I’d love to come to dinner Friday,” he said.

I smiled and hugged him. He quickly turned it into something more passionate, but I didn’t mind that afternoon. In fact, I even returned some of the passion. Normally I held back in front of Alex, as he had always done for me, but today I was letting loose. I don’t know why; I was probably trying to prove a point to Alex, or perhaps to Kate as well. I was trying to show EVERYONE that we were together, and we were getting along just fine.

I drew the line at tongue in public. As soon as Kyle tried, I pulled away, then reached forward and kissed him quickly and softly. This was what he had previously called my signal for ‘whoa there, cowboy, that’s enough for one afternoon’.

“I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then,” Kyle said. He kissed my cheek and walked away.

Alex let out a few whoops of laughter as we headed towards our lockers. “I gotta give it to you, Tahara – I didn’t think you’d actually go through with it.”

I gave him a superior smile. ‘I guess I’m just full of surprises these days, right?’

“Yeah,” Alex said, smiling down at me.

I smiled back and continued walking. But I swear that I heard Alex add, under his breath of course, a very sad ‘you are’.